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Court ruling clears way for giant Fenway development
By adamg on Wed, 03/07/2012 - 7:47am
Developer's rendering of the new complex.
The Globe reports a judge has dismissed a zoning complaint against John Rosenthal's proposed Fenway Center in what is now a parking lot across from Fenway Park.
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Comments
Can anyone comment on this?
Kaz, perhaps? Does anyone know the basis for HRPT's claims of damages? I fail to see how adding a city street adversely affects their own development potential.
Not it
Sorry, I never followed this particular court proceeding related to this development. I'm all for the development though. I think it'll be a great place to live and hopefully put some reasonably priced units on the market with solar-powered electricity, access to the commuter rail, access to the Kenmore/Fenway scene, increased parking near Fenway, and more.
Once I see some floor plans and pricing, I will probably consider whether I could afford a spot in the new building(s) or not.
EDIT: Ok, I was a little bored and went and looked up a previous story as well as the plans and a current map to compare. It appears that in order to get Mountfort to continue through and reconnect to Overland St, the curb and some other work will need to be done that overlaps one of the exits from the next building over's parking lot. They'll lose maybe 10 spaces at most.
To compensate them, the Fenway Center people offered them 10 spaces in the new parking garage(s). The building owners demanded 200 spaces in the new garage. When they were told to go pound sand at such an outrageous demand, they sued to block the project until they got what they wanted.
Would be interesting to know the history
Of if whether Mountfort used to connect, and whether the 10 spots that are "theirs" used to be part of public property? looking at the big parking lot it sure looks like the driveway used to be an extension of Mountfort.
Historically, a railroad track ran through here
and Mountfort and Overland streets would have been on opposite sides of it.
What's now the Green Line D Riverside branch was before 1959 part of the Boston & Albany commuter rail system, and connected through here to the B&A mainline rather than to the Green Line tunnel.
Mountfort / Maitland
Just to clarify, Maitland Street, which masquerades as a driveway into the massive surface parking lot that's there now, is a continuation of Mountfort Street across Beacon. A few yards eastward, it becomes Overland Street because, why not?
Wow that's a lot of parking
About 200,000 square feet of it. I hope they're going to profit off that during Red Sox games, and are not just building it because of zombie MBTA guidelines about Commuter Rail stations: ... must ... have ... parking ... adjacent ... BRAINZ!!!
Feed traffic to the transit station? Stations don't eat cars. And the T doesn't run auto-trains.
I'm sure the engineers who do
I'm sure the engineers who do this for a living have no idea what they are doing. And the state is looking for a place to burn money.
traffic and parking engineers
traffic and parking engineers have a long history of having no idea of what they doing-- i mean they no what they are doing in the moment but have failed to understand the longer term implications of their ideas.
traffic and parking engineers
traffic and parking engineers have a long history of having no idea of what they doing-- i mean they know what they are doing in the moment but have failed to understand the longer term implications of their ideas.
traffic and parking engineers
traffic and parking engineers have a long history of having no idea of what they doing-- i mean they know what they are doing in the moment but have failed to understand the longer term implications of their ideas.
LMA shuttle buses do pull
LMA shuttle buses do pull into the parking lot to reach the station area now.They'll probably utilize the new street from Brookline Ave.
Also included in the project
Is a new Massachusetts Turnpike on ramp. The location was selected to ease local traffic, which now has to go east to the Back Bay or west to Allston/Brighton to get on the Pike.
Just kidding!
Whoa.
This'll be interesting. I'm (kind of) a fan. That area's always felt empty/sketchy to me, so this could go either way. Also, I really like the fenway trinity or whatever that is down the street, so maybe this'll have similar results?
At any rate that bridge building looks interesting. Woe be to anyone living there...hope they have good soundproofing.
Apparently
That will be the parking garage.
No, the parking garage is behind it
Here's a schematic:
http://fenwaycenter.com/wp-content/uploads/2011/08...
The building that fronts Brookline Ave. is labelled "Building 4" and the parking garage is labeled as "parking garage" strangely enough. I believe Building 4 is meant to be residential.
This is going to be a great zipping together of the Fenway and Kenmore neighborhoods. Once it is complete and hopefully successful, maybe somebody will take a stab at the air rights on the opposite sides of Beacon St. and Brookline Ave. Those two will still be half exposed to the Pike when this is completed.
What about Crowne Plaza?
That's built over the pike, do they have problems with noise?